I totaled up my investment balance as of market close yesterday and I have achieved the minimum I set for myself about 5 years ago in order to FIRE. The minimum plan being

- Able to pull out a SWR of 50k per year.- Sell the house and invest the equity. This will remain outside of the other investment pool, not to be touched until we build our retirement home- Get an RV and tour the U.S. for a few years. Last I checked, fairly doable on 25k per year with a paid off pickup and RV.

However, DW and are not sure that is what we want now. Living in a tin can for a couple of years may not be our ideal lifestyle. We also have our 3rd child still in college. It is mostly funded with her picking up the remainder. She's a good kid that pays for her own car by working as a waitress at the Cheesecake Factory. She is well on her way to being an independent, successful young lady.

Until we decide if that is what we want to do, we are still going to work our jobs. As of right now, we are making far more than we ever have with a dual income and both getting paid well. I enjoy my job much more than DW does so I may hang on longer in order to get the account balance up further. DW, OTOH, got spoiled being a SAHM and just prefers that. She’s the type that gets up early and does 10 thousand things every day, most of which is for other people, but hates being under the yoke of a boss. She has to make that decision herself. She puts about 30% of her income into the 401k and a stock plan, but the rest (after taxes) she spends on whatever she wants. Mostly home improvement and the grandkids. Once she quits, that will be curtailed considerably.

My job is writing computer algorithms 90% of the time and just farting around the rest. The worse part of my day is getting up. I have no complaints. But I do want to retire and fart around 90% of the time. I just want to make sure I have all the $ I need to pay for the said 'farting'. lol

I need to spend more time on some of the RE websites and focus on the travel aspects. I’m intrigued by how some of these ER’s travel on 30-40k annual budgets.

In the meantime, just keep paying attention to my investments, contribute and get the SWR up to 60k. Long term, DW and I see us living on a couple of acres in the Rocky’s or Texas Hill country in a 1700 square foot log home surrounded by trees, looking over a lake or river.

This is a good problem to have. It happened before we expected as I just turned 52, so psychologically, I have not wrapped my brain around it yet. But I suspect that will come.

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